WoWCast Developer Chat: Go Into the War Within

news.blizzard.com:

Join Game Director Ion Hazzikostas and Associate Art Director Tina Wang as they sit down with Community Manager and host Bethany Stout to take you into The War Within™.

The alpha test is right around the corner and we look forward to moving into the next phase of development of The War Within with you.

Here’s a recap of some of the main features arriving with the expansion.

Journey through never-before-seen subterranean worlds filled with wonders and lurking perils, down to the dark depths of the nerubian empire, where the malicious Harbinger of the Void, Xal’atath, is gathering arachnid forces to bring Azeroth to its knees.

Freed long ago of the black blade that once bound her, she is now the Harbinger of a new era of the Void’s dark machinations. Her message is clear. The Black Empire has fallen. The Old Gods are dead and their ancient blood runs deep within the cracks of the world. We, the heroes of Azeroth destroyed them and the Harbinger watched all along. While the Black Empire has failed, Xal’atath seeks to set in motion the rise of a new dark legacy —one that knows our strengths and will seek to test them against a terrible power, the nerubians of Azj-Kahet.

Xal’atath has conscripted the nerubian queen, Ansurek, and offered her people a new future in which they would rise from their isolation and become a mighty kingdom once again. We will not find the nerubian soldiers of the Lich King here, but a mighty stronghold of nerubians as they once were—deadly survivors of the mythic wars that have played out repeatedly over thousands of years.

In return for their loyalty, Xal’atath has granted the nerubians the means of a dark evolution that will turn the nerubians into a new kind of ferocious and terrifying soldiers.

Several of Azeroth’s greatest heroes will rise to the call of the Radiant Song, and many will face their own unique challenges along the way.

This chapter is only the beginning of the saga.

Beneath the surface of Azeroth, an expansive world exists, fraught